– They wanted to conquer all of Ukraine and lost. They didn’t achieve their goals. They failed to achieve their strategic objectives and are now failing to achieve their operational and tactical objectives.
US Defense Chief Mark Milley was clear when he analyzed Russia’s war efforts in Ukraine so far during a news conference on Wednesday.
The military general claims that Russia voluntarily entered the war and that it turned out to be a huge strategic mistake. According to him, Russia has not been able to achieve any of the goals it set before the outbreak of war in February. According to Milley, those goals were as follows:
- They wanted to overthrow President Zelensky and his government.
- They wanted to secure access to the Black Sea.
- They wanted to hijack Odessa.
- They wanted to conquer as far as the Dnipro River, pause and then continue attacking as far as the Carpathian Mountains.
READY SPEECH: US Defense Chief Mark Milley during a news conference Wednesday, photo: AP/NTB
sea View
– Suffering violently
Instead, Russia is in trouble and Milley is ruthless in his description of the Russian military.
– The Russian army is in terrible pain. Leaders work hard. They have lost many soldiers. They lost a huge amount of tanks and combat vehicles and lost many fourth- and fifth-generation fighters and helicopters, says Milley.
Despite this, the general is not so sure that Ukraine can win this war militarily. In other words, they can remove Russia from all of Ukraine, including Crimea.
– The probability of it happening soon isn’t very high, says Milley.
Possible peace talks
He believes, however, that he may be more open to a political solution to the war and made headlines last week when he said winter could be an opportunity for peace talks.
Milley believed that the Russian withdrawal from Kherson and the coming winter could give the countries an opportunity to start negotiations.
The statement sent several top US officials into action, frantically calling their Ukrainian contacts to reassure them after Milley’s comments, according to Politic.
The United States wanted to clarify that a winter lull, as described by Milley, does not mean that peace talks have to take place immediately. Instead, they communicated that Washington will continue to support Kiev’s military forces.
According to Politico, the rush to clarify the comments is due to the fact that the United States strongly wishes to maintain a united and equal front when it comes to Ukraine and any peace talks.
